Christine Sun Kim’s The Sound of Temperature Rising Forever. The heavy smog in the images is a combination of both the usual LA pollution and the lingering smoke from the Bobcat fire that is still burning in the national forest near the city. Photo: Ian Byers-Gamber.
The Sound of Temperature Rising
The Sound of Temperature Rising Non-Stop Forever is Christine Sun Kim’s new public artwork, focusing on climate change. Exhibited on a billboard in Los Angeles, CA, the work points to the reality of climate disaster which has become all too clear with the record temperatures and wildfires on the West Coast.
The work merges Kim’s interest in infographics and musical notations. She makes these systems her own, elongating musical notes into an alarming graph. The diagram is accompanied by Kim’s distinctive handwritten text with the title of the piece in bold lettering, emphasizing the urgency of this rise in temperature.
This drawing is part of a wider series of works called “The Sound Of,” in which the artist puts various musical notation symbols to use in depicting inner states (such as The Sound of Anticipation) or abstract concepts (like The Sound of Frequencies Attempting to Be Heavy).
This work, produced by François Ghebaly Gallery, Los Angeles., is located in LA on the 710 Freeway (east of Downtown, near Bandini Blvd) and is on display until the end of October 2020.
“The Sound of Temperature Rising points to the need for significant change now.”
This work is part of our global art action with Countdown, TED’s global initiative to champion and accelerate solutions to the climate crisis. We worked with a group of TED Fellows on ten public artworks, all launching on 10.10.2020 in ten cities around the world. The goal – to raise awareness for Countdown, while translating key climate issues in ways that spur imaginations and trigger participation. See all projects here.
Photo: Ian Byers-Gamber
Photo: Ian Byers-Gamber
Video: Dash Two
Work by Christine Sun Kim, created for TED Countdown and Fine Acts
Photo: Bret Hartman / TED
THE ARTIST
Born in California in 1980 and now based in Berlin, Christine Sun Kim has built an acclaimed practice around sound, its visual representations and its circulation as social currency. Kim uses performance, video, drawing, writing and technology to reflect on her experiences as part of the Deaf community and to comment on the social and political operations of sound. A keen observer of language, Kim employs American Sign Language, music notation, televisual captioning, and other systems of visual communication in a wide ranging practice that address the intricacies of social exchange and the power of representation with illuminating wit and candor.
Kim has exhibited and performed internationally, including at the MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge (2020); Whitney Biennial, New York (2019); Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo (2019); Art Institute of Chicago (2018); San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2017); De Appel Arts Center, Amsterdam (2017); Berlin Biennale (2016); Shanghai Biennale (2016); MoMA PS1, New York (2015) and the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2013).
Kim is the recipient of an MIT Media Lab Fellowship and a TED Senior Fellowship and has presented at numerous conferences and symposia. Her work has been the subject of reviews and profiles in many publications including Vanity Fair UK, Art in America, DIS Magazine, Artforum, The Guardian, The Wire, Rhizome, VICE, the New York Times, and ArtAsiaPacific.